


Lawyer and Disorder

by cowboylakay



Category: Community (TV)
Genre: First Kiss, Getting Together, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Sensory Overload
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-09
Updated: 2021-01-09
Packaged: 2021-03-13 08:28:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,726
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28650558
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cowboylakay/pseuds/cowboylakay
Summary: Jeff has a terrible day. Abed, being Abed, helps him out.
Relationships: Abed Nadir/Jeff Winger
Comments: 6
Kudos: 54





	Lawyer and Disorder

Today is an awful day.

Jeff just wants the world to shut up. He feels the wind too sharply on his skin, even under a sweater, and he can hear people talking too loudly, like he’s listening to ambient soundtracks of crowds in his ears. His legs feel too heavy for his body and his chest feels like it’s about to cave into himself, hyperaware of every time he blinks or breathes. Everything is just wrong.

He doesn’t even realise he’s in the study room until Britta walks in, saying something he can’t hear through the cotton in his ears. She takes him ignoring her in stride, casts him a momentary glance before deciding he’s just being moody, and takes out her book. Annie and Shirley walk in afterwards, chatting with each other and giggling in a way that’s far too loud for him right now. Britta says something, and Annie and Shirley laugh _loudly_ along with it, and Abed and Troy walk into the room in the middle of a dispute about something, then Pierce is walking in and yelling his greeting, and it’s just _too much—_

He feels a hand on his shoulder. He doesn’t know exactly when he hid his head in his hands, but he flinches at the touch. It’s too warm, too heavy, too much. The hand removes itself instantly, and then there’s the shuffling of footsteps as he hears the light switch click and vaguely sees the lights go out. A door behind him is closed, followed by deliberately quiet footsteps, and then just silence. He thinks he hears breathing, but he’s not sure if it’s him or someone else.

After what could be hours or mere seconds, he looks up. It’s dark in the study room, the blinds having been pulled down to cover the room in darkness, and it’s quiet. He knows there’s someone still in the room, knows that quiet, controlled breathing and the signs of someone trying to help him out. Subconsciously, he begins to follow that breathing pattern, the only thing anchoring him in this dark room from floating away into a sea of endlessness.

“Why’re you still here?” He croaks out, voice scratchy from disuse. His body feels heavy and his heart feels like bricks. His eyes remain closed even in the dark.

“You needed help.” A simple answer, loaded with so many things he can’t begin to process. Firstly, how did he know? Secondly, why did he feel like doing this? Thirdly, is there any _possible_ way he could thank him?

“Thank you,” He says instead, quiet even though no one else was listening in. There’s the sound of movement, and a chair being moved next to him, but not dragging against the carpet like he expected. Part of him is comforted to not hear that sound.

“Can I touch you?” Abed asks him gently. Jeff breathes in, feels the coolness of the table against his cheek, nods. Abed’s bony hand is on his shoulder then, and this time it’s less heavy, like he’s being careful and making sure this is what Jeff really wants, putting effort into making it comfortable.

“Thank you,” He says again, even though it’s just touch. Abed’s hand holds his shoulder properly now, warm and real and comforting. “How long have I...”

“Three hours and seven minutes,” Abed replies, his thumb beginning to rub calming circles against his shoulder. It works. “Everyone left two hours and thirty-three minutes ago.”

Jeff chokes slightly on his own spit. “You’ve been here for three hours? Why?” He asks, finally lifting his head to look at Abed. Abed doesn’t look at him directly, never does, and the darkness helps with not having features to focus on. He thinks Abed might be looking at his cheek.

“You needed help,” He repeats, not removing his hand. The sincerity in his voice does something to Jeff’s feelings, something that causes some of that bad, heavy feeling to melt away. “Do you wanna talk about what happened?”

Jeff looks down at his hands on the table, rubbing his nails with his thumb in that manner that usually always calmed him down. This time, it’s not the mannerism that’s calming him down, rather, Abed. “I... don’t know.”

He’s quiet for awhile, and Abed says nothing, just waits for him to continue. A few minutes pass before he finally has some thoughts gathered and arranged into actual words. “Everything just felt too much,” He says, looking intently at his hands. “When I took a shower, the water pressure was too strong even at it’s lowest. I went through four different shirts because none of them felt right on my skin. Everything felt too heavy, like I was carrying boulders on my back.” He feels a wave of guilt and shame rush over him. He’s not exactly sure why. “Everyone was just so loud, and Britta and Annie and Shirley were laughing in my ears, and you and Troy talked about everything and nothing at the same time to the point I couldn’t understand if you were speaking words I knew, and Pierce was _yelling,_ and—”

He stops, breathes in, clenches his hands into fists and tenses up. The hand on his shoulder stops moving, before it slides down to his arm. “Is this okay?” He hears Abed ask, as if from far away. He nods, then the hand moves lower to his forearm. He nods again, then the hand covers his clenched fist. He looks down at it for a moment, listening to Abed breathe and trying to copy it, and opens his fist. It’s a little sweaty and the marks of his nails are imbedded into his palm, but Abed slots their fingers together and holds his hand with the gentleness he’s come to expect from him.

“It’s called sensory overload,” Abed says in a low, hushed tone. Jeff knows it’s for no one’s benefit but his, and isn’t sure how he feels about it. “It’s when you’re so overstimulated from everything that’s happening at once, and your brain kind of short-circuits because it can’t handle all of these inputs. You’re processing _everything_ around you, and that’s not something your brain can take.”

Jeff looks at their joined hands, thinks about how Abed’s hand has callouses yet feels soft. He bites his lip for a moment, squeezes Abed’s hand just to feel the pressure of it. Abed squeezes back. 

“I feel pathetic,” Jeff says quietly. Something in him breaks at that.

“It’s not,” Abed tells him immediately, picking up those pieces, “It can happen to anyone. It happens to me more times than I want it to. Sometimes there’s a trigger, like something bad happening or a nightmare, and sometimes it just... happens.” Abed adjusts their hands so that they’re palm to palm. “It’s not pathetic,” He repeats.

Jeff closes his eyes and sighs, nodding wordlessly. He opens his eyes and looks at Abed again, at his eyes, which had been looking at their hands then his face, and at his lips, before he looks down at their hands again. Abed squeezes his hand again.

“Thank you,” Jeff says a third time, even though he knows nothing he could say would truly express how he feels.

Abed smiles at him, the kind of smile that crinkles his eyes and defines his dimples. Jeff has never wanted to kiss him more than he does now.

A little later, Abed walks him to his car, the sun already setting outside. The sunset bathes Abed in a warm orange and a soft glow that makes him look so cosy. Jeff has never wanted to kiss him more than he does now.

Abed waves at him from outside the car, before turning around and walking to his dorm. He’d turned down Jeff’s offer to drive him there, saying Jeff could use the time alone. Said something about how car rides are supposed to be therapeutic. He thinks about how Abed hadn’t said a single movie reference the whole time they were there. Jeff thinks about what kissing Abed would be like.

The next day, he feels better. He feels lighter, as if yesterday had been the opening of a full-to-bursting bottle and today was him walking around without the extra weight. He ate eggs on toast that morning, picked out the first shirt he touched in his dresser and wore it, didn’t speedwalk through the parking lot to the study room. When he arrives, Abed and Britta are already sitting there, talking about something seemingly serious.

“Hey guys,” Jeff says, smiling at them. Britta looks at him weirdly but smiles back, and Jeff realises how good it actually feels to not feel any romantic feelings towards her and how good it feels for her to smile at him without feeling like he’s hitting on her. He wonders when the feeling disappeared and was replaced with platonic affection.

Abed smiles back at him, and Jeff smiles at him with a private smile that Britta doesn’t catch, having looked down at her phone. Abed makes a thumbs-up motion with his hand, and Jeff nods. He feels lighter, even if the weight of his more-than-friendly thoughts towards Abed settles in his chest. He’s pined before, he can get over it.

Then Abed winks at him and all rational thoughts fly out the window.

Before he can properly react, Annie, Shirley, and Pierce walk in, the former two talking again while Pierce looms behind, taking a seat without a word. He’s looking at his phone, laughing at whatever it was he was looking at, and goes on to texting someone. Annie and Shirley whisper to each other like they’re sharing scandalous secrets, giggling quietly and lightly slapping each other’s arms when they get too loud. Britta doesn’t join in, too engrossed in something she was reading on her phone that causes her to make several strange faces.

Troy walks in last, greets everyone, and gets right to talking to Abed. Abed’s leading the conversation, and they’re talking about Pulp Fiction. He hears them talk about the plot and how they should watch it again soon. Abed glances at him with a glint in his eyes. He feels good.

Later, when everyone’s packing up and leaving, Abed tells Troy to go ahead without him and that he’ll catch up later. Troy nods in understanding, a small smile on his face as he leaves. Jeff, bewildered, barely registers Abed moving a seat and sitting next to him.

“How are you feeling?” Abed asks him, genuine. Jeff looks at him, eyes a little wide, and smiles toothily.

“How did you... do all that?” He asks while waving his hand, surprised and curious. Abed smiles back, looking at his eyes briefly before looking at his cheek again.

“When you came in, Britta was telling me about the protests in Catalan, so I told her to look up the news about the protests in Russia today, and she kinda just got sucked in by it. I ran into Shirley at the parking lot and told her about a guy I saw kissing his dog then his girlfriend right after, and she asked me if it was Benny, and I told her it was and she laughed and went to find Annie to tell her.” Abed doesn’t seem to notice Jeff move. “Pierce didn’t take much. I sent him a GIF and he was so impressed he looked at it long enough that he didn’t notice he didn’t yell before coming in.”

“And Troy?” Jeff asks, closer to Abed now than he thought he would ever want to get. Abed still doesn’t notice, and he doesn’t know if that’s endearing or frustrating.

“I just reminded him about the time you got me that imitation suitcase from Pulp Fiction and he went along with it. Then we started talking about—”

Abed doesn’t finish what he’s saying, because Jeff’s kissing him. There’s a moment where Jeff thinks maybe he misread this, because Abed’s not moving and looking at him with wide eyes, then it ends as soon as he sees it and Abed’s opening up and kissing him back, leaning into his space and placing a hand against his neck. Like yesterday, Abed is warm against his skin, even though he feels redder than a tomato. He thinks that kissing Abed is one of the best things he’s done all year.

They part after awhile, a little breathless and their lips spit-slick and kiss-swollen. Abed’s eyes are darker now, more black than brown, and he licks his lips. Jeff mindlessly follows the action, wanting to kiss him again.

“That’s one of the nicest things anyone’s ever done for me,” Jeff says, voice just the tiniest bit shaky. Abed blinks at him, then he breaks out into a smile.

“A callback to a previous quote spoken between friends during a moment where they become something more is a pretty overdone trope—”

Jeff kisses him again, unable to resist himself. Abed sighs into the kiss, leaning forward to deepen it as the hand on Jeff’s neck moves to the back of his neck, tickling the buzzed hairs there as Abed’s fingers card through his hair. Jeff moans quietly into the kiss, encouraged by both that and the introduction of tongue and lip-biting.

“So is interrupting someone with a kiss,” Abed says when they break apart, climbing onto Jeff’s lap and straddling him. Jeff thinks he might be going crazy, if he wasn’t already, for Abed.

“Yeah, well—”

Abed interrupts him this time, kissing him before moving to kissing his jaw and then his neck. Jeff moans at the sensations, panting from the attention. It’s only when Abed goes back to kissing him on the lips that he realises he heavily underestimated Abed’s prowess.

“Now you’re the one who’s interrupting me,” Jeff tells him breathlessly, unbothered and smiling. He doesn’t even remember what he wanted to say.

“Taste of your own medicine,” Abed replies, kissing him one more time like he can’t help himself. “I’ve been waiting to do that for awhile.”

Jeff splutters for a moment, incredulous. “You’ve been waiting? I... I thought _I_ was the one without a chance.”

Abed looks at him with a scrutinising gaze. “So, are you saying...”

“Yeah,” Jeff sighs, disappointed and amused at himself as he shakes his head. He laughs a little. “We could’ve—”

“—Been doing this for longer than we have?” Abed finishes for him, to which he nods. “Yeah, I get that.”

They look at each other again, focusing on each other’s faces. There’s a beat of silence, then they’re both laughing. Then the door is opening as they lean closer for another kiss.

“Hey, Abed, I thought you said—”

They both whirl around to see Troy standing at the doorframe of the study room. Abed nearly topples over, only to be caught by Jeff’s hand catching him by the lower back. Troy looks at them with a shocked look, and they look back.

There’s silence for a moment, then Troy makes a zipper motion with his hand on his mouth. He then salutes at Abed with a serious expression, which Abed returns with an equally serious expression. Troy steps outside, closes the door of the study room, and shoots them both thumbs-ups as he walks in the direction of the cafeteria.

Abed looks back at Jeff and grins. “We should probably go somewhere else?”

Jeff takes a moment to process the last fifteen seconds and mirrors Abed’s grin, opting to worry about that later on. He trusts Troy not to spill the beans prematurely. “I agree. Your place or mine?”

“Mine’s closer, and it’s still the middle of the day. Come on.”

—

Troy joins the rest at the cafeteria, sitting down with them as he continues to eat his food that he left behind. He notices that the fries are missing from his plate, just as Pierce eats another fry. Britta looks at him expectantly.

“Well? Did you find Jeff and Abed?” She asks, watching him as he continued eating.

Troy shrugs. “Nope. They weren’t in the study room. Probably having side adventures.”

Britta nods, not entirely understanding what that meant. Annie and Shirley, who had been curious too, nod along. Pierce hadn’t hear the question in the first place on account of his noisy chewing.

_Side adventures,_ Troy thinks with a smile. _Yeah, exactly._

**Author's Note:**

> i recently experienced the exact same thing as i wrote for jeff, and had to vent it somehow, so i wrote it for jabed and made them have a better ending than i did. troy’s a bro. i will admit i don’t remember anything from pulp fiction.
> 
> i’m [lakay](https://lakay.tumblr.com/) on tumblr


End file.
